InsaneJournal

London Calling Fic: "Impermanent Ink"
Title: Impermanent Ink
'Verse: London Calling
Characters: Shinjiro/Akihiko, Gabranth, Balthier, Fran
Rating: NSFW
Length: 3,900
Summary: Oh, the plot thickens. And there's smut.
A/N: Follows The Junkie Slip, by about three weeks. Narrative shift intentional.



Gabranth watches Shinjiro draw on Akihiko’s arm with a cheap biro, etching in stars with the smudgy ink on the pale, thin skin on the inside of his forearm. Akihiko has a swollen lip and a ruddy fresh bruise on his ribs, but they both look easy, settled for the first time since Gabranth has known them.

“Aki had a good fight last night,” is all Shinjiro would say. Gabranth has been told before that that—these fights—are none of his business, and the understanding with Shinjiro is clear: if Gabranth pushes, they’ll both disappear. He still doesn’t know where they live. Every time Shinjiro goes home, he is tempted to follow—he can tail without anyone knowing, he’s always been a sneaky bastard, even his—well. Everyone says it. But he doesn’t follow, doesn’t ask. They come here, to this big flat still full of Zecht’s books and dishes and even some clothes that make Gabranth feel like he’s always waiting for someone else to come in. But two or three nights a week they’re both here—they both have keys now—and Shinjiro comes by more often, kills time if he only has a few hours between shifts, which seems to happen more and more, that he’s closing and opening. But he looks a little better now than he did before—they both do. Less drawn, less like they’re always cold.

It’s not cold in the room at all, now, the whole place getting thick with summer, and it feels decadent to sprawl on the open sleeper sofa like this, the sheets cool on his bare chest, a Guinness on the floor waiting for his lazy thirst. Shinjiro steals sips from it every now and again, and Akihiko punches him in the arm every time, but it’s with a smile, and the bottle’s barely lighter for each one.

Akihiko is all but asleep now, though, only twitching a little bit when the pen tickles more than usual, and Gabranth finds himself blinking slowly, too. The only light is the low television and streetlamp glow, Shinjiro drawing more of habit than for design, and so Gabranth lets himself sleep, too, calmed by the quiet motion beside him. His alarm will come too early, anyway.

***

Gabranth is up and gone before Shinjiro gets up for his shift, but Akihiko says he woke up when Gabranth left, says it as he itches his arm, smudges the pen-ink. Last night was strange, all three of them asleep on the sleeper sofa, but comfortable, too, and Shinjiro brushes his teeth feeling rested and good. Aki fills a water bottle with cold tea for him, takes water for himself.

“You have bus fare?” It’s not as weird as it should be, getting ready for work in Gabranth’s place without him being here.

Akihiko stretches long, shrugs. “Yeah, but I’m gonna run it anyway.” He laces up his trainers. “You coming home tonight?” He glances around, but there’s nothing suspicious in his look. He’s just asking.

Shinjiro nods. “Got some stuff to do. I’ll be home around seven.” He hasn’t got anything to do, not really, except that when he nodded, Aki grinned, and that’s reason enough to tell Raj to blow it out his ass if he thinks Shinjiro’s going to close again tonight.

Aki walks with him to the chip shop, makes him take the bottle of tea and an apple, too, and then Aki takes off down the sidewalk, his jog like most people’s sprint, and Shinjiro knows he’ll take the long way around.

The day passes quickly enough, and when lunch comes and goes without Gabranth and his badass lady-cop friend—Drace—showing up, Shinjiro starts counting the minutes. He hates the long quiet stretch through the afternoon—nothing doing on a Wednesday—and Tommy fucks off to the shops for his break. That’s something, at least. He kills the television and eats his apple while leaning on the counter, and then he sees the silver and black shine of Balthier’s motorcycle pull up. Balthier parks it right on the sidewalk, just out of the way of the neon sign that says the chippie’s open where he can keep his eye on it the whole time he’s inside. Balthier’s been in a few times, has a weakness for deep-fried Mars bars, and since no one else is here, there’s no one to bitch if Shinjiro makes him one. He chucks a candy bar in the deep freeze—just in case—and mixes up a bit of new batter. Nothing else to do.

Balthier swaggers in, and Aki’s right behind him this time, a big, eager grin on his face. Shinjiro opens his mouth to ask where Fran is—it’s strange enough that they’re separated for ten minutes—but Akihiko is bouncing on the balls of his feet like he hasn’t already run fifteen kilometers today.

Balthier pulls an Irn-Bru from the cooler, cracks it open, sips at it. “Best thing for a hangover,” he says, and he does look a little haggard. Who knows what the Romanies get up to at nights. For all that they live across the campsite, Shinjiro and Akihiko don’t see them that often. Of course, it isn’t like they keep the most regular hours, either.

Shinjiro is dipping the chilled candybar into the batter, crossing his fingers on his left hand that the batter coating is solid—if there’s a bare spot, the whole candybar will dissolve , leaving a crisp batter shell and a fryer full of fucked up oil—and when it’s sizzling safely, Aki’s swinging at the air finally gets to him.

“What?” Shinjiro says, and flicks his shoulder.

“Balthier says our fight’s coming.” He’s fucking beaming.

Shinjiro doesn’t think that Akihiko should look so happy about it, but the way he says it—“our fight,” knowing what that means, that maybe it’ll mean really being able to breathe easy—he almost thinks they can. “When?” he says to Balthier.

Balthier shrugs. “All I know is that he’s on his way north, probably be here in a week or so. Spends a lot of time in Spain, I hear.” He nearly frowns, seems preoccupied with his bottle cap for a moment, and Shinjiro wants to ask what the hell’s going on that Balthier’s so cagey about this guy he wants Akihiko to fight—correction: that he wants to talk to, and Aki’s a good excuse for him—but then Balthier shakes himself out of whatever trip he’s on. He balances the bottlecap on his fingertip, effortlessly. “Don’t get too excited. You’re going to get your arse handed to you. He’s in great shape.”

Shinjiro looks at him. “Figured you haven’t seen this guy in a while if you’re going to all this trouble to talk to him. How do you know what kind of shape he’s in?”

Balthier bounces the cap off the countertop, catches it again, his voice cool but something troubled at the edges, maybe. “He was. And he wouldn’t be such a prizefight if he weren’t still.”

Akihiko looks unconcerned, and Shinjiro’s not worried about Aki, either. This guy’s just a guy. That’s it. What’s that to Akihiko? But things have changed, since Gekko, since before. It still feels like there’s something missing, sometimes, when he’s walking home in the wee smalls, when he slides in beside Akihiko and he’s so sleep-warm that it almost feels like their thin mattress is fuller than the two of them could make it. Shinjiro shrugs hard, hands Balthier his deep-fried Mars. “Aki’ll be fine. And then we’re good, right?” And they can forget everything about—about that night. Shinjiro wishes he’d stop having nights like that.

Balthier produces a butterfly knife from nowhere and hacks apart the crispy, gooey mess, nodding around a chocolate bite. “Square,” he says. “I’m not—”

But then the bell jingles on the door, and there is Gabranth, his badge already tucked away, his uniform shirt open, his shoulder bumping Akihiko’s just a little, friendly, and Shinjiro’s just about to say hi when Balthier drops his candybar. And his eyes are wide for just a heartbeat before he bends down, cleans it up, and he keeps his head craned at the floor.

“Sorry, mate. I didn’t knock him into you, did I?” Gabranth gets two more napkins, hands them down to Balthier.

Balthier shakes his head, doesn’t answer. Shinjiro is puzzled, but he doesn’t want to ask. The last thing he needs is Gabranth getting curious about Balthier.

“Let him buy you a new one,” Shinjiro says. “He owes this place a pound or two.” He’s already dipping a second—and a third, while the batter’s fresh and Tommy’s off—and maybe Gabranth will eat half of it because Aki won’t touch them.

Gabranth says yes, let him, and then his attention is on Shinjiro, watching him carve meat from the rotisserie. “Spoiled fucker,” Shinjiro says. “You don’t even bother ordering anymore.” From the corner of his eye, he sees that Balthier is standing again, and he is looking at Gabranth. Looking at him like he’s a ghost. Gabranth turns his head, looks at Balthier. His eyes start to narrow a little, to get suspicious, and Akihiko darts forward. He slaps at the back of Gabranth’s collar, then stomps down hard on the smeary lino, dragging his shoe. There’s no telling one scuffy spot from another.

Gabranth startles, rubs his hand over the back of his neck. “What the hell?”

“Spider,” Akihiko says. He shoves at Balthier’s arm. “Pretty boy here’s scared stiff of them.” Aki shakes his head. “Pussy.”

Now Balthier seems to snap out of it. “Sorry,” he says. “Parents were too fond of dodgy sleep-away camps.” Then his mobile rings. He snaps it open, glances at the screen, snaps it closed again. “And sorry again.” He makes a rueful face at it. “Work calls.” He ducks out of the shop, is on his bike, and is gone.

Balthier hasn’t got any work that Shinjiro knows of. At least none that’s going to call him in at three o’clock in the afternoon. He glances at Gabranth, who’s only watching after, looking from Balthier’s abandoned drink to the place where the bike was.

“Peculiar guy.” Shinjiro can see the badge repinning itself to Gabranth’s shirt, the buttons doing back up. And he doesn’t know how to stop it, but Akihiko does. Akihiko, with his sweet, golden-boy face when he wants to wear it, and he’s wearing it now.

“He just went chicken shit over a spider the size of a pencil eraser,” Aki says, and he sips at Balthier’s soda. “I’d bail, too.” He shrugs. “He’s a nice guy, though. Used to work with him at the Y, but they didn’t like the earrings.”

“Did have an awful lot of them,” Gabranth says.

“So?” Shinjiro pushes up his sleeves, flexes his inked fingers, and Gabranth rolls his eyes.

“Oh, you mischievous lads.” Every inch of his voice is an Irish grandmother’s, and Shinjiro and Akihiko laugh. Shinjiro offers Gabranth one of the new Mars bars, keeps one for himself. He’ll be sick from the richness of it, but he’s not about to let it go to waste. Gabranth takes it, looks at his shawarma, and asks Shinjiro to wrap the sandwich up. “Going to give me a heart attack with shite like this,” he says. But he takes a big bite, and he’s grinning.

Shinjiro’s trying to figure out what it was Balthier was looking at—he figures Balthier’s probably on the wrong side of the law, but Balthier’s cool enough not to let a cop walking into a place fluster him. And then the sound of Gabranth’s voice settles it—that folded picture, the brother, the twin. When Gabranth turns to throw away the paper wrapper, Shinjiro catches Akihiko sizing Gabranth up—it’s a look Shinjiro knows, knows so well—and so he’s figured it out, too.

He turns the conversation to where the fuck Tommy’s gotten to, and when the back door finally opens and closes, Shinjiro just calls back that he’s leaving.

“Don’t have to work all night for once?” Gabranth picks up his takeaway container, holds the door for both Shinjiro and Akihiko.

Shinjiro shakes his head. “Seven nights in a row—fuck him.”

Gabranth says they’re welcome to spend the night, but Shinjiro shakes his head again. “Got some stuff to do,” he says, and Akihiko slides his hand in Shinjiro’s back pocket, the way he’s never done.

Gabranth smirks at Akihiko, and he leaves them at their bus stop. Akihiko leaves his hand where it is while they wait, but they don’t talk on the ride home. It isn’t until they’re back in the caravan—almost pleasant today, with the weather dry and the sun still shining—that they say anything to each other about the afternoon.

“Do you think you could take him?” Shinjiro makes tea, and Akihiko pushes all the laundry that’s on the tiny table off onto one bench. “If this guy really is Gabranth’s twin.”

Akihiko doesn’t answer right away, and that’s interesting. He’s fought bigger, and he’s fought badder. But neither of them know what this twin is like, either. Just because they’re brothers, doesn’t mean they’ve got anything in common except looks. He finally says, his hands around his mug, “The point isn’t the fight.” He drinks. “It doesn’t matter if I win.” He frowns, bothered by the arrangement now, now because it’s not about boxing. Balthier never said anything about beating the guy, only about getting them both in a single place.

Shinjiro snorts. “Of course it matters.” Probably be a lot of money in it if Aki does win.

Akihiko puts his palm under his chin, cracks his neck, and then lets himself sag into his hand, his elbow knobbed and pale. He seems to be thinking something, but he doesn’t say anything else. Instead, he reaches with his other hand, pulls Shinjiro to sit beside him. Akihiko thrums with energy, even though he’s still carrying the bruises from the fight just two days ago, and his quiet, savage happiness keeps Shinjiro from asking whether Akihiko thinks this will really be the end of it, if they can really trust Balthier and Fran and what’s going to be next, what comes after all of this. Instead, Akihiko takes the mug from Shinjiro’s hand, bites softly at the line of his mouth.

They jostle the table—Akihiko turning so they face full-on on the thin bench seat—and the tea sloshes out of the cups, runs downhill—because nothing here’s level—to puddle on the floor. Akihiko’s hands are warm under Shinjiro’s shirt, warm with the night and the blood that also colors his swollen lip, and Shinjiro doesn’t care if the floor’s tea-sticky in the morning, but he doesn’t want to dump two full mugs, and they are push-pulling each other across the narrow kitchenette, toward the bed, and there’s a big dark splotch on the lino—no, it’s just a trick of the light and the shadow cast by the laundry in the corner. Akihiko sees his eyes dart down, and his hands are fists clenched in Shinjiro’s hair, pulling his gaze up, his teeth sharp in Shinjiro’s lip, and they compel each other into the mattress.

Akihiko still hasn’t washed off the smudging ink from the night before, and it smudges more under Shinjiro’s tongue, the muscle of his forearm, the naked softness in the elbow’s crease. The ink is like a ghost of a taste, bitter but not enough to count, and his tongue’s probably going black with it—yes, it is, because he watches his mouth smear darkly over Aki’s biceps, their wiry strength, and then across the line of his shoulder, the arc of his collarbone, and down to the tattoo itself. The flesh is thinly raised by the ink etched into him, a rippled texture under his tongue, and this doesn’t fade or weaken under the mouth’s wetness.

Aki doesn’t flinch when he bites, not when his teeth make a red ring on the compass rose’s imperfect edge, not when drags them down to the bruise on his ribs. No, Aki holds him fast and hard against his skin, his fingers tangled tight in Shinjiro’s hair, and he snarls, shoves Akihiko back.

“Quit fucking yanking on my hair.”

Akihiko grins, gathers himself the way Shinjiro has seen him do before. “Make me,” he says, and licks his swollen lip.

It clicks with the popping of Akihiko’s knuckles—the mad bastard is getting off on this, on the fact that Gabranth’s twin might be real competition, on the fact that someone might actually give him a damn beating, because there’s something quiet and coiled and dangerous in Gabranth, too. They’ll see. They’ll see whatever there is that’s going to happen.

But not before he wipes that smug look off Akihiko’s face. He yanks his shirt off and throws himself at Akihiko; the whole caravan rocks with it.

They claw at each other, Akihiko tugging sharply on his hair whenever he can get a hand up, but Shinjiro finally works him over onto his stomach, one arm held up behind his back. He keeps a good hold on Aki’s wrist, uses his knees to pin down his legs. Aki twists, reaches, scrabbles at the corner of the mattress, but instead of reaching for some kind of hold to give him leverage, he tosses the tube of Astroglide back. But he still bucks up one more time, almost enough to make Shinjiro crack his nose on his own knee.

“Ass,” Shinjiro says, and yanks Aki’s jeans down just enough, so they’re pinning his thighs, making it harder for the bastard to kick. His slap is sharp, the handprint pink on the pale skin.

Aki laughs, startles, laughs harder, and when he wrenches his arm free, he only uses it to brace himself. “You spank me again, I’ll kick your—” His breath stops short with the slicked thrust of two of Shinjiro’s fingers, knuckles-deep and sudden, and Shinjiro exhales with him. He can’t even get his own jeans all the way off, either, just pushes them down so they’re both rasping denim when Shinjiro molds himself over Akihiko’s back, his fingers still caught in the clench of him. He is slow now, where the breach was sudden, and he curls his fingertips down, presses until Akihiko starts cursing in Japanese, quietly, never one for being loud with his mouth when he can make noise in so many other ways, and Shinjiro waits until he can see the white spots on Akihiko’s knuckles, until Aki’s hips cant into his hand. He can’t keep himself from rubbing on Akihiko’s hip, too, lets one more small arch convince him now, now’s already a minute too late, and his cock is slick and they’re solid, crushed together in the oranging evening light.

His hand closes on Akihiko’s cock just as Aki’s reaching, too, and their fingers lace there while Shinjiro inks Akihiko’s shoulder with the imprint of teeth, impermanent. His right hand grips tight on Aki’s hip and he fights for control though he’s barely moving—barely has to, because now Aki pushes back into him, rocks back sharp and his fingers fist tighter over Shinjiro’s, tighter until it has to hurt, until he spills over their hands and onto the blanket beneath. Akihiko’s body is all clenching muscle, in his shoulders, in his legs where their jeans catch dryly beneath the sweet-slick slide of them together, and Shinjiro bites a new ring under the first, shudders and stills. Akihiko is holding them both up, just for a moment, then they separate, slowly.

Shinjiro peels his jeans all the way off, catches the cuff of Akihiko’s, tugs. The air’s going cool, drying the sweat and the come, but they don’t reach for the sheet. Too early for that. But they twine their legs together, lift one edge of the curtain to watch the rest of the campsite. Balthier and Fran’s bikes are still missing, and Mrs. Davis’s Radio Four is blaring over the rabbit-ears telly in the caravan beside theirs.

Akihiko reaches and closes his thumb and forefinger on a clump of Shinjiro’s hair, pulls just enough for Shinjiro to smack his hand. Aki grins, slides his whole hand—not the one still tacky with spunk, and he’s fucking lucky—and pulls their mouths together. They kiss until everything nearly feels quiet, until the window screen seems to go solid and the campground’s miles away. Shinjiro pulls back first, but he doesn’t make Aki move his hand.

“Pain in my ass.” Akihiko’s so warm he doesn’t want to move, but the dried come’s starting to itch a little.

Aki shifts, flops his hand toward his pants, and he winces a little. “Pain in mine.” But then he stretches, sighs, grins again, before he flexes his fingers. “I want a shower.”

Shinjiro doesn’t blame him. He feels a little sticky, too. He actually grabs his pants, flops his feet toward them. “Could go get one.” Even if Gabranth’s not there, they’ve got keys. And maybe there’s more to find out. Shinjiro thinks hard as he zips up, starts lobbing some of their dirty clothes in Aki’s duffle. If they’re going, might as well wash some things. Gabranth said once that he knew a little about boxing, that day they helped him move, and there’s no sense waiting around to see if Balthier will come back tonight. There’s no finding him or Fran—they’ve tried.

Aki makes a face while he puts on his own jeans. “Think you could find that picture again? I want to look at it.” They both know which one.

“Yeah,” he says, and he kills the lights, locks up with the padlock Fran welded in for them. One inside, one out. It doesn’t look nice, but who’s counting? Akihiko slides his hand into Shinjiro’s back pocket while they walk for the bus. Shinjiro doesn’t know what to do, not really, so he just returns the favor and shoulders their dirty laundry.